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Savannah

Published: July 22, 1990

To the Editor: As one who has been doing research on the history of Savannah, I enjoyed Peter Applebome's piece on ''Savannah's Leafy Green Squares'' (Travel, May 13). I would, however, like to set the record straight on Savannah's Mickve Israel Synagogue, which Mr. Applebome notes, ''describes itself as the oldest Reform congregation in the United States.''

The colony of Georgia was founded by James Oglethorpe in February of 1733. On July 11 of that year a group of 42 Jewish colonists from London landed in Savannah. This was ''the largest group of Jews ever to sail on one vessel for North America in colonial times,'' as Jacob R. Marcus wrote in his study of ''The Colonial American Jew.''

Oglethorpe is generally thought to have let the Jews land, in spite of the stated opposition of the trustees of the colony to Jewish settlers, because Savannah was in the midst of an epidemic of fever. The colony's sole physician, Dr. William Cox, had recently died. Among the Jews was a renowned physician, Dr. Samuel Nunez, who had served the royal family in Portugal. Oglethorpe later credited Dr. Nunez with saving Georgia.

In 1735, the Savannah Jews founded Mickve Israel congregation. It is the third oldest Jewish congregation in North America. The original membership of Mickve Israel was largely Sephardi and it ''preserved Sephardi traditions until the early 1900's when it joined the Reform movement,'' according to the historian Rabbi Malcolm H. Stern.

The cradle of Reform Judaism in the United States was not Savannah but Charleston. The Jewish community in Charleston is even older than that in Savannah and dates from 1695 or earlier. In 1749 the Charleston Jews were numerous enough to form a congregation, Beth Elohim, which was Orthodox.

We can date Reform Judaism in the United States to 1824 when a group of Beth Elohim members resigned from the congregation in Charleston. Their desires for changes in the Orthodox ritual had been thwarted. They organized the Reformed Society of Israelites, which existed only a few years but pioneered many Reform practices.

The Encyclopedia Judaica and the Encyclopedic Dictionary of Judaica agree in considering Charleston the ''birthplace of Reform Judaism in America.'' Savannah can, I believe, claim to have the oldest Jewish congregation that is now Reform.

Charleston and Savannah also have old Jewish community cemeteries. That in Charleston dates to 1764 and Savannah has two old Jewish cemeteries, a burial plot granted the Jews by Oglethorpe and the other donated later in the 18th century by Mordecai Sheftall.

FREDERICK HECHT

Jacksonville, Fla.

Photo: Mickve Synagogue in Savannah, Ga. (Ursula Mahoney)

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